> > > Visiting India in 1921, E. M. Forster witnessed the eight-day > celebration of Lord Krishna’s birthday. This first encounter with > devotional ecstasy left the Bloomsbury aesthete baffled. “There is no > dignity, no taste, no form,” he complained in a letter home.
Brits were kinda uptight back then. See "The Family Guy" for the scene where they depict British Porn (probably on You Tube). Hilarious. > Recoiling > from Hindu India, Forster was relieved to enter the relatively > rational world of Islam. Describing the muezzin’s call at the Taj > Mahal, he wrote, “I knew at all events where I stood and what I heard; > it was a land that was not merely atmosphere but had definite outlines > and horizons.” Yeah, as an infidel. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infidel) -- welcome to Monotheism: there can be only one > > > The British Army captain who discovered the erotic temples > of Khajuraho in the early 19th century was outraged by how “extremely > indecent and offensive” depictions of fornicating couples profaned a > “place of worship.” Lord Macaulay thundered against the worship, still > widespread in India today, of the Shiva lingam. Even Karl Marx > inveighed against how man, “the sovereign of nature,” had degraded > himself in India by worshipping Hanuman, the monkey god. > Fornication rules. Watch the Animal Channel -- under our civilian vaneer we are so much like our primate cousins that it's chilling. > > Repelled by such pagan blasphemies, the first British scholars of > India went so far as to invent what we now call “Hinduism,” complete > with a mainstream classical tradition consisting entirely of Sanskrit > philosophical texts like the Bhagavad-Gita and the Upanishads. In > fact, most Indians in the 18th century knew no Sanskrit, the language > exclusive to Brahmins. My ancestors were Brahmins -- both landlords and civil servants in recent history. When I hear how they treated non-Brahmins, it makes me furious. Egalitarianism isn't beneficient, it's protecting ones own freedom. > > And they found keen > collaborators among upper-caste Indian scholars and translators. This > British-Brahmin version of Hinduism — one of the many invented > traditions born around the world in the 18th and 19th centuries Everybody wants to rule the world. That should be the qualifiing test to make sure that you're never allowed to. > > These mostly > upper-caste and middle-class nationalists have accelerated the > modernization and homogenization of “Hinduism.” And in the US, rich people brandish Christianity while mocking Obama for saying "We all do better when we share the wealth a little bit." What kind of pinko commie would say that (Why... their own Jesus Christ). People with money and power use whatever powers they can to hold their own positions and enfranchise their children to it. > > > Far from being a slave to mindless > superstition, popular religious legend conveys a darkly ambiguous view > of human action. Revered as heroes in one region, the characters of > the great epics “Ramayana” and “Mahabharata” can be regarded as > villains in another. Demons and gods are dialectically interrelated in > a complex cosmic order that would make little sense to the theologians > of the so-called war on terror. Polemic thought makes everything easier. It makes hate and love so much more passionate. Nevermind that it mirrors almost nothing in the natural world. Brain hurt me think too hard, ugh. > > As she puts it, “It’s not all about Brahmins, Sanskrit, the > Gita.” It’s also not about perfidious Muslims who destroyed > innumerable Hindu temples and forcibly converted millions of Indians > to Islam. It makes perfect sense to me that people disenfranchised by Hinduism would willingly convert. Shovel your own nightsoil, Brahmins. BTW, Christianity permeanted the Roman Empire in the same way -- blessed are the poor? One life and then heaven? Where do I sign up?!? Can't blame 'em. I'd have done the same. > > Happily, it will also serve as a salutary antidote to the fanatics who > perceive — correctly — the fluid existential identities and commodious > metaphysic of practiced Indian religions as a threat to their project > of a culturally homogenous and militant nation-state. I think they'd find any pretext for this. I'm somewhat surprised how violent the empahtically indenfied Hindus are here. Lets do some empericism. Traits of the most economically successful countries with the highest average level quality of life: 1) Not very religious 2) Highly egalitarian 3) Polite drivers who follow the rules 4) Low corruption 5) Alcohol consumption 6) High degree of women's rights, and promiscuity 7) Low or no abject poverty 8) Low violence and crime (I'm not talking about the US on this -- mainly western Europe) I dunno what it is but the countries that treat women like second class citizens, are incredibly concerned about everyone elses sex life (and limiting it), drive like thoughless maniacs (e.g. don't give a crap about anyone but themselves, the net result being everyone losing, like in game theory), and so on -- these countries don't seem to do as well. Correlation, causation, reverse-causation, I don't know. But India is WAAAAY too concerned about who prays to whom and eats what and looks at what woman and so on. But the younger generations seem to be getting over this. I peg India's future success on them. And the past poverty (c'mon India's been here for HOW long, and yet countries much younger are more modern) on the old guard. That said, the Romans were the pinncale of the ancient european world, and now Rome is a nightmare (or at least the drivers are). WHile the second derivative of human progress might be positive, the first order function is sinusoidal, not linear. Will someone please invent a USB breathalizer so I don't send things like this at times like now. :-)
